Thursday, 30 April 2015

People with insomnia and other sleep problems have increased sensitivity to pain, reports a new study. The effect on pain tolerance appears strongest in people who suffer from both insomnia and chronic pain, who may benefit from treatments targeting both conditions.

Since when, in the 21st century, did it become an acceptable part of democratic dialogue to attempt to ridicule and reduce political opponents by systematically mocking their physical characteristics? Or by contemptuously defining and dismissing them as ill and disabled? Moreover, how has it become acceptable that ill and disabled people are held up as objects of political derision?

Loneliness is bad for you. Some experts have even likened it to a kind of disease. What's unclear is how being being lonely leads to these adverse effects on our health. A new study looks at one possibility – that loneliness makes people feel hungrier than normal, thus increasing their food intake and putting them at risk of obesity with all its associated health problems.

Wednesday, 29 April 2015

Monday, 27 April 2015

Brand new research published in the last few weeks reveals important information for people with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome/Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (CFS/ME) and Fibromyalgia (FM). The research helps explain why individuals dealing with these complex disorders have poor response to physical activity and poor energy production. The cutting-edge studies offer new insight and tools for supporting these devastating illnesses.

A must-read letter which sums up the daily experience of ME very well indeed:

The determination with which society refuses to acknowledge the severity of ME would be hard for me to believe if I didn’t witness it almost daily. A week after major surgery, I am multiple degrees less sick than Jeannette is almost every day, but–except for her fellow patients from whom she fortunately draws a lot of strength–nobody around her knows it. Worse, it seems that people don’t want to know it.

Thursday, 23 April 2015

Being dangerously overweight is all down to bad diet rather than a lack of exercise, according to a trio of doctors who have reopened the debate about whether food, sedentary lifestyles or both are responsible for the obesity epidemic.

In an article for a leading health journal the authors – who include British cardiologist Dr Aseem Malhotra, an outspoken critic of the food industry – accuse food and drink firms such as Coca-Cola of having wrongly emphasised how physical activity and sport can help prevent people becoming very overweight.

The truth, they say, is that while physical activity is useful in reducing the risk of developing heart disease, dementia and other conditions, it “does not promote weight loss”.

Researchers have uncovered the critical role in pain processing of a gene associated with a rare disease. Their breakthrough paves the way for a better understanding of chronic pain conditions, they say.

Sunday, 19 April 2015

Researchers looking at how to tackle the country's obesity issue -- which costs the NHS £6billion pounds every year -- found that currently individuals are often treated the same regardless of how healthy they are, where they live or their behavioural characteristics.

The research found those who have a BMI of 30 or over actually fit into one of six groups and strategies to successfully tackle weight loss should be tailored according to which group they fall into.

In April it was the turn of the Wimborne Railway Society's biennial Wimbourne Model Railway Exhibition at Queen Elizabeth's School, from which the above is from Terry Harrington's layout Woodley Moor, a fictional ex Midland Region mainline station set in Yorkshire. We particularly like this scene with the cattle being driven (clearly, back out to the field after milking) as this creates the feeling that more is going on than if they were just standing in a field.

The other takeaway from this show was seeing what can be done (see below) with some Celotex insulation board and Woodland Scenics Realistic Water™, as with cliffs, sea, river and a waterfall planned for our layout, this will undoubtedly prove to be invaluable knowledge.

Thursday, 9 April 2015

According to study co-author Arif, while eating beans often carries health benefits, some types are not as strong nutritionally. "Baked beans are also rich in sodium, sugar and fat, and depending on the type, rich in uric acid. Some beans contain lectins that are linked to irritable bowel syndrome, multiple sclerosis, allergies and arthritis. EBV infection has been associated with all of these medical conditions."

According to study co-author Arif, while eating beans often carries health benefits, some types are not as strong nutritionally. "Baked beans are also rich in sodium, sugar and fat, and depending on the type, rich in uric acid. Some beans contain lectins that are linked to irritable bowel syndrome, multiple sclerosis, allergies and arthritis. EBV infection has been associated with all of these medical conditions."

Wednesday, 8 April 2015

“Dramatic” and “life-changing” benefits cuts will be imposed if the Tories are running the country after 7 May, Iain Duncan Smith has warned.

They could include taxing DLA, PIP and AA, axeing contribution-based ESA and JSA, abolishing the work-related activity group of ESA, cutting carers allowance numbers by 40%, and making people pay the first 10% of their housing benefit.

For many, these will be life-threatening cuts, rather than life-changing ones.

But claimants are in a position to prevent them happening.

And it won’t take a miracle.

In fact, just an additional 5% turnout by working age claimants could have a dramatic and life-changing effect on IDS and his plans instead.

But a higher turnout won’t happen by itself. Labour are too frightened of the tabloids to try to rally claimants. Many of the major charities and disability organisations have been scared into silence by the Lobbying Act. And the media has little interest in benefits cuts, other than to applaud them as a good thing.

So it looks like it’s up to ordinary claimants to make sure as many other claimants as possible understand the threat they are facing.

In this newsletter we tell you what’s at stake and how you can make a difference.

Sunday, 5 April 2015

The fact that the alterations in the immune factors in the ME/CFS were almost as extreme as in multiple sclerosis – a disorder characterized by severe central nervous system dysfunction – suggests a major pathology is present in the central nervous systems of ME/CFS patients.

The low cytokine levels suggests that some sort of immune exhaustion – caused by an infection or by immune upregulation – is present in ME/CFS. These findings parallel those of the recent Hornig/Lipkin study suggesting that immune up regulation early in the disorder may lead to immune burnout later on.

Several of the immune factors in the ME/CFS patients spinal fluid suggest an allergic type of reaction may be occurring in their CNS. That is also found in some central nervous system infections – so an infection could be driving this process.

The immune factor most identified with the ME/CFS patients has been associated with cognitive declines, aging and reduced neuron production.

A Michigan research group following arthritis patients undergoing hip or knee replacement or remodeling has found you don’t need to have full-blown fibromyalgia to have major pain problems – you just need to have something like it.

Like others in the field, they noticed that surgical outcomes often do not track what they see on their scans. Some patients with major structural problems are in less pain than patients with minor structural problems. Some patients with apparently successful surgeries aren’t have successful outcomes. Even after alleviating their structural problems some patients pain levels are still so high that their surgeries declared failures.

Something other than knee or hip damage is impacting these patients. That something appears to be a ‘proto-fibromyalgia’ state; not full-blown fibromyalgia but a lesser form of it.

Thursday, 2 April 2015

A recent study by the University of Florida has found that the neural pathways that transmit feelings of pain to the brain may do their job too well in ME/CFS patients, causing the exhaustion experienced by many after even the most minor of tasks. It also has found proof that muscles and other peripheral tissues contribute to the experience of fatigue.

The study focussed on the role of muscle metabolites, demonstrating that the neural pathways are activated when a person exercises their muscles, causing the metabolites to be released. Researchers found that the pathways seemed to be more sensitive in ME/CFS patients than in healthy controls.

Wednesday, 1 April 2015

Henderson, a psychiatrist, asserts herpesviruses are a major issue in misdiagnosed chronic fatigue syndrome adolescents and patients. Dr. William Pridgen, a surgeon, proposes antivirals and anti-inflammatories are knocking down herpesvirus infections in people with fibromyalgia. They’re bucking strong headwinds for sure, but their message is getting out there, and it’s getting into surprising places.

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"Chaos was experienced as a feeling of alienation from oneself, of being unable to determine one's own living conditions, and of being unable to handle stress situations by the same means as before. The path from chaos to cosmos was discovered by telling one's life story, which proved to be a creative process relating and integrating the present with the past, and providing an overview of one's life cycle."

I believe

"The moral test of a society is how that society treats those who are in the dawn of life . . . the children; those who are in the twilight of life . . . the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life . . . the sick, the needy, and the handicapped."